This was a real stinker. Not in any dictionary I could find, English or French. But I found severalsites that mentioned it. Many were names of reataurants. One was a magazine "L'Assiette de la Beurre"A couple were about tables for computation. An "assiete de calcul" was a hand held calculator. FinallyI found a couple sites that showed pictures of"Assiettes" that were plainly dinner plates. I'm still annoyed.

Anyway, assiette of calcul is like our "assetto di calcolo", and here assetto is - ah, very hard to describe.Assetto comes clearly from "sedere" = to seat, and the meaning is that you as a person are in assetto di calcolo when you seat comfortably, and ready to computate, and in the appropriate mood to do it.

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